Our Last Hope
by Poddy
Summary: A CounterStrike fan fic. Set in the popualar maps of the game. Follow the story of the map from raiding the building and taking hostages to escaping with or without them. Good reviews will keep the story going :Rated T for language and violence.


Our Last Hope

(a/n) Hello everybody, this is my first fic in this section (second fic overall, my other is in the UT section) so hopefully it will go quite well. In this story called: "Our Last Hope", I will try and write and capture the atmosphere of some of the popular Counter-Strike maps, before and after the fighting. This first chapter is set in the map csoffice (if you don't guess from the story).I will try and keep the same characters each time, but to save time they won't really have much of a background so we can get into the action much faster. Obviously if one character dies then you won't be seeing him again, but there could still be references to him in future episodes. I hope this will be a fresh new angle on the things, and maybe some connection with the hostages, (instead of shooting them when they get stuck) in a way you would actually care if they died or not. Ok then, so without further ado, I give you:

Chapter 1: You'll never believe what happened at work today…

Snow fell gently outside of office building 52376; Steve King sat in his small office chair staring out of the nearby window at the snow-laden front yard. He re-positioned his thick glasses and looked back at the papers on his desk. Steve clicked the top of his pen and rested it beside his papers.

A mug with 'Hardly working' printed on the side lay half empty with cold coffee inside. Chris Crocker took a sip and cringed as it hit his tongue. He rested the mug back down and marked another paper with his signature: 'C.C'.

"Man, I can't believe I'm in this damn office for my daughter's wedding". Mike Hong remarked as he saw Crocker come into the room to throw away his coffee.

"Better not say that to the boss though. He can get your ass fired quicker than anybody else here, whether we got weddings or not."

"Guess your right. It's just…ah forget it." Hong returned to his paper, then swiveled his chair to his computer. He caught Crocker in his eye and glanced to see what he was doing. He was just standing there looking out the window where he had thrown the remains of his coffee.

"What are you staring at?" Hong said as he walked up next to Crocker by the window.

Crocker still looked concerned and pointed out the large van in the parking lot with about half a dozen men gathering around outside. "Now I know for a fact that they aren't clients of mine." Hong looked just as puzzled as Crocker did as they saw the men, now in balaclavas, put on large black jackets.

"This doesn't look good." Hong said.

"Holy shit!" Crocker blurted out as he saw what he knew was a sub-machine gun being given to one of the men.

King rushed round the corner to see what all the commotion was about. "What the hells goin' on?" he said, re-positioning his glasses again. All three men pressed up against the window to watch the strange men in balaclavas gear themselves up in equipment that was certainly not needed in an office.

King spotted one man with an AK-47 advance on the building with several other men behind him. "Oh my god" he said under his breath.

"Shit, we gotta warn the other guys, quick!" Crocker said and managed to tear his eyes away from the window. He ran down the office corridors shouting for his colleague Bill.

"Bill!" Crocker shouted as he checked around the rooms. Bill was the boss' deputy, so he had direct access to him to tell him what's going on. Nobody really knew Bill's second name, he only really moved into the office a few weeks ago so be assistant to the boss of the whole place.

Crocker finally found Bill just heading into the boss' office. Crocker managed to stop him before he went on.

"Bill!" Crocker said, slightly out of breath. "We gotta tell, the boss something. These guys in a van are com-". Crocker was cut off mid sentence when a small metal grenade landed softly by the doorway leading from the steps from the parking lot.

The small object let off a mighty flash, blinding Bill and Crocker. All they could see was a wall of white; Bill tried to feel his way back through the building but could only seem to find walls. Their ringing in their ears was added to a further extent by what seemed like explosions coming from all around. Crocker was thrown back against the wall behind by the invisible (to him) explosions. Bill collapsed and they both blacked out.

Three men in balaclavas rushed in straight afterwards, each brandishing an AK-47. The trio walked past Crocker and Bill who lay in a crumpled heap on the floor. One of the men in balaclavas lightly kicked Bill, but got no response.

"I'll take them. Clear out of the rest of the building." A gravelly voiced man holding an MP5 came up behind them and said. The other three nodded and ran around the next corner. The man with the MP5 smiled and looked at the bodies.

Suddenly, he heard a scream from his left and he wheeled around pointing his MP5 in the same direction. A panicking woman sprinted around the corner into the man's view, obviously in a desperate attempt to get to the stairs and into the car park.

The man fired off a sharp burst at the woman. Three bullets cut through her chest and she dropped to the floor, dead. The man had a sick grin on his face when he gunned her down. He heard more gunfire and walked up to the corner the poor woman had just sprinted around.

A few more burst of fire where heard throughout the office. Followed by screams and smashing sounds. The trio who originally entered the building ran around into Hong and King's office. Several other employees were in there as well. The leading member of the trio kicked the door down and fired five bursts into the room; decorating it with bullet holes.

The other two rushed in afterwards and hunted down anybody they could see. One employee crouched behind his desk in desperate fear of not being shot. Suddenly, bullets ripped through the flimsy wooden table, bullets pounding into the back of the victim.

Gasps were heard from all around, foolishly giving away their positions. All three men fired bullets across the area. A scream was heard as one man stood up after being shot in the back, he was gunned down quickly. Blood sprayed the wall behind him as he buckled over his desk.

"It's fucking terrorists man! Run!" one man shouted and made a dash for the nearby window. The three of the terrorists looked and pointed their weapons at the man who miraculously managed to get out the window without being shot.

"I'll get him" muttered one of the terrorists. He ran up to the window the employee had escaped from and smashed it with his gun. He stepped into the empty window frame, the glass crunching under his feet. He pointed his weapon downwards, and in hail of bullets, cut down the man trying to escape. He fired several more shots into the body before stopping.

He turned back from the window, glass being scraped in and onto the carpet and quickly spotted another hiding employee to his right: Hong. Hong knew he had been spotted and stood up with his hands up.

The terrorist put his gun up to his shoulder and pointed the barrel straight at Hong's face. Hong cringed as the weapon became alarmingly close to him. Sweat ran down his nose and dripped onto the floor.

King was watching from the other side of the room, remarkably he hadn't been spotted yet, and hopefully he could get out alive. "No, please." King whispered ever so quietly. The terrorist pulled the trigger. 'Click', he swore but never took his eyes off Hong. Without warning, he hit Hong in the stomach with the butt of his rifle, knocking the wind out of him; then he brought his rifle upwards into Hong's chin. Violently kicking his head back and knocking him over, and unconscious.

"That's all of them. What, are we gonna do with this guy?" one terrorist said after scanning the room then looking at Hong's body.

"Report back to Bennett. He'll tell us what to do next." said another. The other two terrorists nodded and followed each other out of the room in silence. "Got another clip?" one mumbled in the distance.

King scanned the area to see if it was clear. He could still hear the conversations of the terrorists, however they were very muffled. King crept over the counter silently and walked over to Hong's body, it gasped as he saw his face which was already bleeding from the blows.

Suddenly, the voices in the distance became louder and King decided to get back to his original position. He was too late. The terrorists had re-entered his office and this time there was more of them. King had to hide next to Hong's body. He could hear the terrorists conversation much better now.

"Yeah, we got everybody in this room, and we got one guy over there who's just knocked out." One said.

"Good, they can go with the others." Came the distinctly gravelly voiced reply. "Bring them through here and meet in the back rooms with the others." The leader walked out of the room and left the others to get Hong. They both still had their backs turned to King; he took his chance and stepped out into the open past the smashed window, treading on the broken glass with a loud 'crunch'.

King swore silently and quickly leap-frogged into cover and rolled. The terrorists in the room sharply turned around and looked at the window. One of the men cocked their rifle and advanced slowly. "Don't worry, he's only gonna be an employee" one said as he walked directly towards King's hiding place.

The terrorist walked up to the shattered window frame, he had an option to go left or right. He saw King's foot poking out. "Aha!" he exclaimed and fired a few rounds at his foot. One bullet pierced through the hollow drywall and tore into King's leg.

King clutched his leg and was in so much pain he could barely make a noise. The terrorist who had just shot him was just about to take a step further towards King when an employee burst out behind the terrorist where he was open and put one arm around his neck.

In the other hand, he was brandishing a Swiss army knife, with the largest blade on it drawn out. He pressed it up against the terrorist's throat and turned to face the other terrorist's in the room.

They put their weapons to their shoulders and aimed at the man. The employee had clearly panicked and now had no idea what to do next. Instead, he repeated: "I'll kill him, don't move! I'll kill him!" He glanced at the phone for a split second. The terrorists were reluctant to shoot; they weren't sure about killing their own man over some nut holding a knife when they had high-velocity rifles.

The employee shuffled over to the phone with the terrorist still in his grip. He reached for the phone with the hand that was brandishing the knife. As soon as he even touched the phone, another terrorist cocked his weapon. The employee quickly raised the knife back up the terrorist's throat again, threatening to slice his neck open.

The other terrorists said nothing, not a word was said throughout the whole incident. Both of the side knew exactly what was going to happen if they said something out of place. The employee made another reach for the phone, this time the terrorists did nothing.

He carefully picked up the phone and dialed. He had the phone pushed up against his shoulder, he started talking.

"Hello?" he seemed relaxed at first, but he burst out in panic and started shouting frantically. "Oh god please help! Office 52376! They have guns help!" that's all the terrorists wanted to hear…and so did the police.

The terrorists all opened fire when they saw the boss coming around the corner. Regardless of their friend, they opened fire. AK and sub-machinegun bullets tore through the terrorist and the employee. Red coated the wall behind them, the receiver was smashed apart when it was next to the employee's head, and the rest of the phone was trashed under a coat of bullets.

Both bodies slumped backwards, knocking over an office chair and spilling blood on it. King was totally shocked and started to black out like the others. As his vision faded out he saw the terrorists walking over to the two corpses and checking them.

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At the police station an alert was raised concerning the phone call they had just gotten from Office 52376.

"Get a squad assembled, now!" bellowed the chief down the phone to the Special Forces attachment downstairs. He slammed down the phone and stormed out of the office and downstairs to where he just called.

As he stomped down the stairs, one of the squad members caught sight of the chief.

"Yes, we heard you chief, don't worry." Harris the squad leader remarked with a cheeky grin on his face. The chief merely grunted and carried on walking to where the rest of Harris' squad was.

He burst into the Special Forces squad's quarters and shouted: "C'mon you lazy ass holes we got an alert get your gear ready! Come on!" He wheeled around and exited sharply.

"Think he stole your line there sir." Clarke said with a smile when Harris entered.

"Ok men, let's get geared up and ready to go, I'll brief you in the helicopter on the way over. Let's go!" Harris secured his helmet on and walked through to the armoury, the rest of his men followed quickly afterwards.

"Ok, get your weapons men! We've got clearance on all lethal forces here so don't hold back." Harris barked to his squad.

One this men in his squad: Byrnes, picked up a Tazer and put it in his back pocket. Clarke quickly reached in and took it out again.

"Don't bother with this shit Byrnes. We wanna kill 'em, not zap 'em!"

"Oh, sorry sir." Byrnes replied. Byrnes was the new recruit around the Special Forces unit, but that wasn't to say he couldn't kill a man, he was still learning, and was usually put on the less dangerous jobs.

Spencer grabbed an M4 from the rack in front of him. He pulled out the magazine and swapped it for another, with armour piercing bullets. He also packed a Desert Eagle pistol, only with one clip, and some flash bangs. He cocked his weapon loudly and hollered as he followed Harris to the Heli-pad outside.

Clarke, Byrnes, Goode, Spencer and Wilds followed with their favourite weapons and equipment.

On the Heli-pad, a Black Hawk was waiting with the rotor blade going already. The men clambered aboard with their weapons slung over their backs. The helicopter took off almost instantly.

"Man, this must be pretty big. I mean, with all access to the armoury and stuff. What did they say happened sir?" Goode asked as he checked his P90.

"We got a hostage situation here men, this must be serious 'coz this Office 52376 is one of main financial buildings in the city. This isn't the first time it's been attacked." Harris said over the radio so everybody could hear over the loud rotor blades.

"This looks like your first hostage rescue where the hostages aren't made of cardboard buddy!" Clarke laughed and patted Byrnes on the back. The chopper started to descend slowly, and then rather rapidly, soon the whole squad could see the ground coming towards them.

"Get ready!" Harris shouted when they were only a few metres from the ground. The chopper landed with a soft thud and all the men rushed out with a second thought. Clarke leapt out and rolled on the soft snow and into position. The squad held a defensive position around the chopper whilst it took off.

"Ok men, let's move. The building isn't far from here, kept it tight." Harris ordered, and the men trudged off through the snow behind their squad leader.

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"Urrghh" Bill groaned as he slowly came around. His head felt extremely heavy and he was lost all of his memory from when he was just about to go and see his boss. Bill looked around him; he was sitting down on a couch with Crocker sitting next to him.

He put his hand up to his temple and felt a sharp jabbing pain; he looked back at his hand and saw it was covered in blood. Bill swore and turned around to look behind him, two terrorists were there with a pistol in each hand.

Bill quickly turned back round again. He glanced at Crocker's body next to him, he didn't know if he was dead or unconscious. He could see that he was breathing, so that must be good. Bill stood up to stretch but the two terrorists saw him told him to sit down or get hurt. Bill did what he was told.

In the main meeting room, Hong and King were both sitting on the table being watched by three men with armed with rifles. Neither of them had said anything to each other, probably because of fear of being killed by the terrorists.

Hong peered round to try and see a telephone; he noticed it had been smashed to pieces. He looked back to King and shrugged. The terrorists had done it to all the phones in the entire building.

King heard footsteps and got off the desk and stood up back against the wall. The leader came into the room, with two of his men behind him.

"Well, well." Bennett started. "You two have got to be some of the luckiest guys I know. You're very lucky to have survived that incident. But who knows? Maybe you would prefer being dead, then you will have nothing to worry about." There was quite a pause before he continued. King looked over Bennett's shoulder, distracted by the projector on the table displaying a mix of pie charts and graphs. "But before that happens, let me ask you a question: You know just as well as I do there is a safe in your office containing cheques with large amounts of money of the average tax-payers money, the only slight problem we have now, is that we need to codes to open the safe. It appears we under estimated how good your security was. Now we can make this nice and simple, or we can do it the hard way. Which would you prefer?"

Neither Hong nor King said anything. They looked at each other nervously, expecting the other to speak first before they did themselves. The leader soon lost patience and made the decision for the both of them.

"I see you want to do this the hard way then. Very well." He signaled his to come forward and they positioned their rifles in a stance where they were going to strike them. Hong tried to take a step back but there was only a wall there.

"Now, are you going to tell us the codes?" the terrorist leader asked. Neither Hong nor King replied again. The two men closest to them stepped forwards and struck them in the stomach with the butts of their rifles. They both keeled over and lay coughing on the floor.

They were dragged back on their feet, and were about to be struck again. "Are you going to tell us the codes?" the leader repeated. The other two men moved forward to strike them again.

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Harris pulled the garage door open and let his team slip through, he followed quietly after them. They had entered the main parking lot and checked if the coast was clear. Clarke spotted a van badly parked just around a corner. "Go check it out you two" Harris said pointing Byrnes and Clarke. They both nodded in reply and crept over to the truck.

Clarke pointed his weapon in the open rear of the truck. "Shit" he said quietly. Byrnes came up behind him and looked inside, he swore too. Clarke looked back at the rest of the squad and signaled for Harris to come over here.

Harris came over quietly. "What is it guys?" he asked and peered inside. "Oh my god, were they gonna blow this place up when they left? Jesus, there's enough explosives in there to blow this place up ten times over!" Harris exclaimed. He carried on inspecting the inside of the van, he started nodding.

"Ok" he said, Harris looked back and signaled like Clarke for the rest of the squad to go to him. The squad acknowledged and they crouched beside the van.

"Ok, I want Byrnes to defend this truck at all costs. It doesn't sound too exciting kid but trust me; you might get the most action so be really careful. We can't afford anymore men to stay here with you 'coz otherwise our attack on the actual building won't be strong enough." Byrnes nodded and seemed happy enough with Harris' decision. Harris continued:

"Now, Spencer and Goode, I want you two to go down the right hand side up those steps into the building. You see them? Good. And Clarke, Wilds and I will go around this left side. Once we've secured the area find the hostages, if you find them beforehand, radio me and we'll be there to help. Everybody ready?" he looked around his squad. They all seemed to agree. "Let's go then!" Harris barked.

The squad split, each small group moving out in a hunched over stance. Harris waited and watched Spencer and Goode disappear around a large container and get into position. Harris looked back at his group, then at Byrnes who nodded towards him. Harris replied with the same gesture. Signaling to move forward, Harris stepped out into the snowy front yard, a quiet 'crunch' coming from under his boot.

He pointed his M4 around the corner and then followed it with his body. It was all clear. Harris turned back to Clarke and Wilds, "follow me" he whispered and pointed towards the large entrance in front of them below the large numbers of the office.

Harris looked back around and swore as he suddenly saw a terrorist with his back against the window holding a pistol. Fortunately, he also had his back to Harris' squad too; Harris raised his weapon to fire when he unexpectedly heard the 'zip-zip' sound of a silenced weapon directly behind him. Wilds let off three controlled bursts at the threat behind the window.

Bullets pelted through the glass, shattering it and thumping into the back of the terrorist. He stumbled at first and hunched over, when a final bullet ripped through into the back of his skull, tearing it open, and killing the terrorist swiftly. Harris saw the body drop behind the distorted and shattered glass. "Go go go!" he shouted and advanced quickly into the entrance straight ahead.

Clarke kept his weapon and eyes firmly on the doorway at the top of the small flight of stairs they were escalating. Harris reached the top of the stairs and fully revealed himself in the doorway. He felt rather exposed, seeing as there were almost four places where and enemy could pounce from at any moment.

Suddenly, his fear was made a reality, when a terrorist darted out from his left, where the recently deceased foe was laying, firing frantically at the group. Harris jumped out of his skin and leant back as he fired just as recklessly as the terrorist who had just fired at him, merely in a natural reaction.

Miraculously, neither man hit each other, despite the fact that they were mere feet away from each other. The threat disappeared from view to the right as Clarke leapt forwards to catch and kill their recent attacker. He peered around the corner to his right, with his weapon up at his shoulder. The attacker had managed to make it around another corner and well out of sight.

Clarke was just about to creep out of his cover and follow their target when, without warning, a hail of bullets flew in from his left. Clarke snapped his head to the direction of the bullets and diving into the cover of a corner in front of him. The terrorist was firing from the hip, and as a consequence, hit nobody, merely taking chunks out of the surrounding walls.

Harris and Wilds ducked down behind the shallow cover of the stairs they were standing on. Bullets whizzed and hissed over their heads, taking more chunks out of the wall behind them. Neither of them dared put their head up.

Clarke crouched next to the body of the terrorist they killed earlier and pushed himself up against the wall beside him. The fire stopped abruptly as the terrorist ran out of bullets and had to reload. Harris saw him dive down and behind a vending machine that had been toppled over.

Wilds and Harris heard the reloading sound of the man's rifle. "Go for it Clarke!" Harris shouted. Clarke nodded and just as he was about to take one step out of his cover, the terrorist who had originally fired at them almost at point blank range, leant out from behind some filing cabinets and let off a burst from his AK at Clarke.

More holes were made in the window behind Clarke as he tried to crouch down even further and taking another step back into his cover. Clarke replied with a small burst from his P90, bullets sparking and deflecting off the filing cabinets mere split-seconds before the terrorist ducked back behind his own cover.

As soon as this happened, the man behind the vending machine started blind firing by firing his weapon over the top without looking. Wilds and Harris hastily took to their cover again, it was unlikely they would get hit, but they couldn't risk it. Clarke fired another burst at the filing cabinets, in an attempt to knock one over. He hit one along the top and made it wobble slightly, before being fired back at with severe retaliation.

Several bullets thudded into the corpse beside Clarke as he tried to get as low as he could without lying down. Bullets were flying everywhere, taking chunks out of walls and smashing windows even more. It was a crossroad of suppression and fire. Harris' group was pinned down.

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Spencer sharply turned the corner leading up staircase. A terrorist stood at the top of the stairs case pointing his weapon straight down at him. He let off a few rounds at Spencer, before ducking back around into cover. Spencer had done the same mili-seconds before the man fired. Bullets deflecting and chipping off the parking lot floor just inches away from his foot.

Goode crouched down next to a large blue container to his left, avoiding the fire completely. It fell silent for a second as the fire stopped for a brief moment, then Spencer leant around his cover and fired a few rounds back at the terrorist.

Spencer fired one controlled burst from his MP5, then, still leaning around his cover, waited for the enemy to pop out again. He did just that, and as soon as he revealed himself again, Spencer squeezed off a large burst from his weapon, the bullets cutting the terrorist down in his tracks.

Bloody sprayed the wall behind him, and the terrorist yelped as he fell on his back. Goode peered around again and examined the body. "He's down!" he shouted, and Spencer moved in towards the body. Goode followed right behind him, his gun checking every hiding spot and open area for threats.

Spencer stood over the corpse and examined the entry wounds he had just created. Goode kept an eye on what was behind them whilst Spencer seemed to stand there gawping at his kill. "Yeah he's dead." confirmed Spencer. Goode turned to look at the corpse, looking at the variety of bullet holes riddled in the poor man's body.

"You think?" he replied sarcastically. "Let's go then." Spencer nodded and followed Goode out of a small exit halfway up the staircase they were on. Goode pointed his weapon at the two large windows the were above them, making sure nobody spotted them.

He leapt up onto a small crate in front of him, then onto another stacked on top of a large box. The small makeshift staircase lead conveniently up to the windows they were about to break through. Goode stood on his tip toes and peered over the edge of the window sill, looking for enemies.

All of a sudden, a terrorist emerged from around the corner, ahead and to the right. He spotted the top of Goode's head instantly and fired frantically with his rifle from the hip. Goode ducked right in the nick of time. Bullets shattered the window above, glass showering Spencer and Goode as he got his head down to avoid getting cut.

Goode was hunched down, and the terrorist rushed towards the window to fire down on the two haplessly exposed Special Forces members below him. Spencer spotted the hazard just as he was visible through the shattered window. He fired a long burst from his MP5 at him, the bullets streaming over Goode's back by mere inches. The terrorist threw himself backwards to avoid getting him by the flying hail of bullets.

His maneuver caused to fall flat on his back, but not sustain injury, which was the most important thing, he eagerly got back on his feet again and sprinted towards the window again, nearly toppling through it when he stopped to fire again.

Spencer ducked behind a small box whilst he reloaded, bullets hailed down on his position. Goode hopped up onto the last stepped stone to the window: another large container. He rolled to the left, still in a crouched position; snow covering the back of his kevlar jacket. He raised his weapon to his shoulder and was split-seconds away from slamming on the trigger and blowing away the threat barely a few feet away from him, when the terrorist switched his fire to Goode at the last second.

Goode's eyes widened as bullets riddled flak jacket, upper body and head. Exit wounds were punctured all over his back as he stumbled backwards and slowly toppled off the back end of the container, his body landing with a chilling 'crack'. Spencer gasped as he saw Goode's lifeless body drop just a few feet away from him.

He didn't have much time to think about it, the fire was directed at him again. The box he was crouched behind was only flimsy, and offered no real cover whatsoever. Spencer turned 360 degrees left and moved out of his cover at the same time and stood up behind his new cover, the large container, with his back up against it.

It was good timing too, just as he moved, bullets shattered the flimsy box, sending splinters everywhere, and bullets thumping into the snow right where Spencer would have been not a second ago. Spencer spun around and out of his cover and fired a long burst at the terrorist. In the disorientation of firing his weapon, he thought he saw one of his bullets score a lucky hit, bloody bursting from his enemy's cranium.

Without taking a risk, Spencer took to cover. There was no firing anymore, Spencer spun out his cover again and aimed firmly at the window for a good thirty seconds. His hands were shaking and he could feel sweat seeping from under the skin of his forehead. Spencer spied something on the wall, he squinted and could finally picture a large splatter of blood on the wall directly behind the man he thought he had just killed.

He hopped up on the route that his late team mate Goode had used the quietly clambered through the empty window frame. Spencer quickly looked back at his feet, to make sure they were up and in the building. He looked back round and saw the dead foe, about 2 metres back from where he was, with a gaping hole in his head.

Spencer, looked in shock at his small sub-machinegun. "Sheeit!" he exclaimed under his breath, before looking back and forth between the MP5 and the corpse, a surprised and puzzled look on his face.

Gunfire suddenly snapped him back to reality. It was coming from the first corner on his left, it seemed quite dangerous; bullet holes were being frequently made in the elevator doors to Spencer's right. He clambered back up on his feet and stuck close to the wall and advanced up to the corner.

Pulling the same maneuver as outside, he spun out if his cover and quickly scanned for an enemy, there was one merely two feet way from him, Spencer thundered a whole clip into the back of a terrorist hiding behind (now only) two filing cabinets. Sparks flickered and spat off the terrorist's cover as the close range fire cut him down with ease.

Clarke saw Spencer emerge from, then dart back into his cover and kill the man who had been pinning him down for the past few minutes. "Shit was that Spencer!" Clarke shouted out to Wilds and Harris.

Harris nor Wilds heard him over the loud cracks of their rifles. They didn't even acknowledge that one of the terrorists was just killed and Clarke was unsuppressed again. Spencer looked back at the corner where he saw Spencer dive out from, he emerged again, then looked relieved as he lowered his weapon when he spotted Clarke.

Clarke suddenly realized he was no longer being suppressed, and waited for Wilds and Harris to stop firing, then made a dash for the vending machine. The sprinted out just as Harris finished reloading and hopped on top of the machine and fired down on the doomed terrorist below him. Clarke coated him in bullets and them ran back to his original cover.

Harris and Wilds looked at each other in surprise. All was silent around the small crossroad area. Harris stood up fully and walked over to Clarke's position. "Jesus man! Couldn't you at least tell me first before you jump up and do something crazy like that?" Harris said loudly in Clarke's ear. Clarke shook his head and rolled his eyes.

Harris looked up from Clarke and watched Spencer walk towards him, passing the doorway to his right on route. Suddenly, Spencer looked to his right in the direction of the doorway and raised his weapon and started to fire when a hail of fire greeted him.

A bullet clipped Spencer in the arm, knocking him back into the wall behind him. More bullets flew in, taking out chunks of the wall he was up against, one stray shot hit the fire extinguisher to his left and set if off, sending foam and gas spewing in all directions. It created a mask that nor Harris, Clarke or Wilds could see through.

The three other members stayed glued to to their cover. All they could hear was the thumping of the bullets as they pounded into the wall behind Spencer. Just praying that when the foam cleared he would be ok, they looked on in anticipation as the smoke started to clear. Spencer lay in a pool of blood, with entry wounds all over his front. He had collapsed on his side, the blood from his exit wounds smearing the wall behind him.

"Aww fuck" Wilds whispered under his breath as the extinguisher's mask fully cleared. Harris managed to tear his eyes away from the bloody mess that was Spencer, and concentrate on his mission.

"Follow me." He ordered down his radio to Clarke and Wilds. The both responded with a somewhat skeptical: "Roger that". Harris took the point as he moved past the toppled over vending machine with terrorist corpse behind it. The corpse was lying face down into the blood stained carpet. Harris turned the body over, he had never seen so much blood on one person before.

Harris looked back at Clarke who shrugged back. Harris chuckled, "Jesus, two in the chest and one in the head would've been fine you know." Clarke smiled and followed Harris as he moved to the next corner.

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Crocker sat up sharply as he heard a sharp burst of fire come from only a few rooms away. He was on the verge on panicking and making a run for it, regardless of the consequences. Bill sat up soon after, he had only come round a few minutes ago, and was just as nervous as Crocker at that point. Another burst of gunfire echoed throughout the building.

Crocker and Bill looked at each other, they had no idea what was going on. Whether their assailants were killing or being killed, or merely firing bullets in celebration. Bill opened his mouth to speak when more gunfire cut him off.

Suddenly, a young looking terrorist ran into the room where Bill and Crocker were, past the two guards guarding them, and into the room with Bennett in it. Bill watched him go past, he had a splatter of blood on his flak jacket and his weapon too. Crocker missed him run through, but saw him dart into the main meeting room.

King panted heavily as he took another blow to the stomach. He kept keeling over, but each time he was dragged back up and struck again. They seemed to being going a bit lighter on Hong than him, they were merely slapping him around the face. Both the hostages would quite happily tell Bennett and his men the codes, but even if they wanted to speak, the words could hardly escape their mouths. They were struck before they could speak.

Hong nor King had heard the gun shots from the other room, they had obviously been too nauseous to notice anything apart from their beatings. The young terrorist burst in panting just as hard as King and Hong, King breathed a long sigh of relief when he saw the young man in panic, then, all of a sudden, could hear the gunfire from the other rooms.

"Sir!" the young terrorist said breathlessly. "We've got SWAT guys or something attacking! They're comin' down the right hand side at the moment, they already got half of our guys! We need to get out or do something fast!" he continued.

Bennett stood, with a blank expression on his face. Then he slowly started nodding and barked out some orders: "You!" he shouted, pointing at the young man in front of him, and then to the two men beating Hong. "Get down the to parking lot! That's their only escape route from here, go!" The three men nodded and ran off towards the parking lot one after the other.

Bennett pointed towards the two beating King and told them to stand out front with Bill and Crocker. They both cocked their weapons and rushed out of the room. Bennett turned to face Hong and King, he weapon pointed squarely at their faces in turn. King swallowed hard.

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Byrnes looked into the back of van they recovered at the start of the mission for the almost tenth time. He had seen no action at all since the start, but that was all about to change. Until now all Byrnes had heard was the occasional crack of gunfire, nothing more. He had no idea Spencer and Goode were dead, or that three armed terrorists were coming straight for him.

Byrnes had managed to get the car started a few minutes after the two squads went off, he figured they would need it if they wanted to escape. He had hot wired a few cars in his life, this one was probably the easiest.

Without warning, a bullets flew in a 'dinged' off the side of the van, merely a few inches from Byrnes' head, breaking his chain of thoughts and kicking him into action. Byrnes whipped his head round to look in the direction that Goode and Spencer went and saw three terrorists running towards him firing.

Byrnes ran around behind the van and leant out from his cover to see where the terrorists were coming from and if there were any more. The trio of attackers took cover behind large boxes or containers. They still kept firing at Byrnes' position in a vein attempt to hit him.

Few bullets even hit the van, let alone Byrnes. He could probably stand out in the open and not get hit. Three more bursts of fire streamed towards the van, Byrnes ducked back behind it. He leant out himself and let off a few bullets at each enemy's position, none of his bullets hit, just hitting or deflecting off the their cover.

Byrnes was about to fire again when all the three terrorists came out of their cover and fired a long burst at him. Bullets really pounded the van this time, Byrnes only made it to cover split seconds before the shots hit. One of the bullets hit to van's left rear tyre. Bursting it with a loud 'hiss', one side of the van dipped slightly as the hissing continued.

"Shit" said Byrnes as he saw bits of rubber get thrown across the parking lot followed by the 'hiss'. He leant out of his cover and fired off a few shots, when he was answered to by a burst three times as large, forcing him to duck back down again. Well, at least Byrnes was seeing action.

One of terrorists on the attack clambered over some boxes and hopped down back to ground level and into the slight cover of a large blue container. Byrnes saw the silhouette of the terrorist hop down from the boxes. He turned to face him, and let off a burst from his M4. He hit nothing.

Another terrorist tried to follow suit, but Byrnes knew exactly where he was going. He let the terrorist climb up onto the same boxes and stand up to hop down, then, just as he was about hop down, Byrnes let off an accurate pair of bullets right at the foe.

The bullets cut through his flak jacket and into his flesh. He stood almost stunned for a moment, then one more bullet hit him in the chest, making him stumble then collapse backwards and land in a bloody and crumpled heap.

Byrnes grinned as he watch the body land on the floor, but foolishly, he wasn't paying attention to the remaining terrorist in his original cover. Byrnes turned to fire at him when a shower of bullets came down right on top of him.

Sparks coated the part of the van exactly where Byrnes was. A few sparks fizzed off the side of his goggles as more bullets came flying in from all around. Byrnes saw the opportunity to reload and kept his head down as he swapped the half empty clip for a new one.

The terrorist who had originally climbed over th boxes on the left hand side of the parking lot, saw his chance to advance on the van and crept towards Byrnes cover, keeping close to the walls.

Byrnes popped out of his cover with a fresh clip and fired several shots back at the man who had nearly killed him a second ago. He was oblivious to the terrorist sneaking up on him to his left with his AK armed and ready.

Byrnes ducked back behind his cover as more bullets hailed down on him. Suddenly, the stealthy terrorist leapt out from in front of the van and into Byrnes' view. Byrnes nearly jumped out of his skin as he saw his foe jump into sight and point a gun at him.

Byrnes fell flat on his backside and released all of the bullets from his clip into the enemy from the hip. He could barely keep his eyes open as he fired all of his bullets into the enemy in front of him. Holes riddled the terrorist, shaking the front of his body, but somehow keeping him up right. Byrnes' weapon stopped firing, he opened his eyes fully and saw the terrorist breath out heavily with a slight hint of pain in it. Blood seeped out from his wounds as he toppled backwards and landed flat on his back in a slowly growing blood of his own blood.

Byrnes sat there stunned for a few seconds, still breathing heavily with his eyes wide open. More bullets whipped into the side of the van he was behind, snapping him back into reality. Byrnes stood up and reloaded behind his cover. He looked back down at the belt around his waist and only spotted one more magazine, he swore and switched the catch of the side of M4 to single shot before leaning out and firing back at his enemy.

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Bennett couldn't help being distracted by the gunfire coming from the building, it kept cutting him off mid-sentence and throwing him off task. He finally snapped and let out an aggravated grunt and stomped out of the room with his MP5 in hand. Hong and King looked at each other but said nothing.

The two men that Bennett had ordered to stand out front with Bill and Crocker were crouched behind a counter with a computer at each end. Their weapons were rested on it and primed to unleash hell. Bennett crouched down in between them, pointing his small MP5 in the at the doorway that lead into the room.

Bill and Crocker lay huddled behind the sofa they were thrown on at the beginning of this whole incident. They occasionally poked their heads up to see if anything was happening, all that was happening was the increasingly loud bursts of gunfire drawing in closer every minute.

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"Ok it's clear!" Clarke shouted as another terrorist fell to the floor covered in blood. He paused to reload as Harris crept forwards towards the body, which the squad assumed was the man who had killed Spencer just a few minutes ago. Wilds towered over the corpse and turned to nod at Harris, they just approached one of the penultimate rooms before finally getting to the hostages. Harris took point once more as Clarke caught up and they carried on with their mission.

Bennett and his men held their positions, there was a horrible amount of anxiety and tension in the room. Bill and Crocker still lay huddled behind the sofa, the room was totally silent, all that could be heard was the shuffling of the terrorists as they re-positioned their footing behind cover.

The tension was too much for Bennett. "Psst!" he signaled at the man in front of him. The young man turned around and faced him. "Go out and see if they are coming, do it now!" he said in a whisper.

The young man in a balaclava nodded reluctantly and crept forwards with his Galil rifle in hand. As he approached the doorway he paused for a few seconds, glancing back Bennett who was still signaling for him to get on with it. He looked in front of him again and strafed out of the doorway in a crouched position.

Suddenly, the young man who was now in the open gasped out loud and dropped his weapon as bullets thundered into his chest and head, knocking him flat on his back; his eyes still wide open as his head lay limp to one side facing Bennett almost looking at him with an expression of accusation.

Bennett swore as he watched the body drop. He cracked under the pressure once more and fired out of the doorway and into the tall, thin glass panes lining the corridor. Bullets smashed and shattered the glass panes, letting in the cold winter breeze.

Harris sucked right up to wall as more bullets came flying in, smashing glass as they came past. The fire stopped, Clarke looked back down at Harris' fresh kill and noticed just how young the terrorist was. His eyebrows raised slightly as no other facial expression could be seen behind clothing covering his chin. He shook his head gently.

Wilds drew out a flashbang from the belt that circled his waist and tossed it gently over to Harris stretched out hand. The flashbang flew past Clarke line of sight, snapping him out of his chain of thoughts. Harris caught the flashbang and held it in his left hand and prepared to throw it.

Bennett paused to reload when he saw the familiar rectangular grenade land gently in the center of the room. Before he could react, the flashbang exploded in a mighty flash of light, blinding everyone in the room, including Bill and Crocker.

"Go go go!" Harris shouted as he sprinted into the room, scanning for threats. He spotted one right in front of him, completely oblivious to the incoming Counter-Terrorists. Harris gunned him down with a quick burst without sparing a second thought. He spied for another assailant. There was another crouched behind the counter in front of him, he raised his weapon to fire when Wilds cut in front with his M4 and cut him down.

All Bennett could hear was a ringing in his ears and muffled shots from a weapon. His vision hadn't started to clear yet, so as far as he knew, he was lying down directly in the center of the room. When, suddenly, he felt several stabbing pains in his chest. He let out a cry and clutched his stomach before breathing out extremely heavily and collapsing.

Clarke sprayed the room recklessly, cutting down another blind terrorist in front if him. The force of the impact threw the terrorist backwards and slid him across the counter before slipping off the side with a gentle 'thud'. Clarke grinning boisterously as the corpse fell neatly next to another.

Harris watched the body of Bennett finally fall lifeless. Bennett was the last terrorist they knew of in the building and the room was clear. Wilds leapt over the sofa Bill and Crocker were crouched behind and aimed his weapon at them in an adrenaline induced rush. He lowered his weapon and called for Harris and Clarke. The other two came rushing over to see Wilds' discovery.

Bill and Crocker stood up nervously with their hands raised in the air. Harris smiled as he watched their nervous faces relax as they saw the bodies of their captors laying all around. The room had a somewhat macabre decoration scheme, but it worked for them. Harris patted Crocker on the shoulder:"C'mon let's go, we gotta get out of here. Do you know where the other two hostages are?"

Bill nodded. "Yeah I do" he said confidently. It was the first words he'd spoken since the incident happened. "Where?" Clarke responded. "Follow me" Bill said.

Bill walked into the projector room where King and Hong lay beaten and bruised on the table. They both looked up, a totally relieved expression fill their faces. Harris saw the hostages and rushed past Bill towards them.

"You're gonna be ok" Harris smiled as he grabbed Hong by the shoulder and pulled him towards Bill. They laughed as the employees looked in awe that they were all alive and well, if not a little beaten up. "Ok let's go Harris interrupted. We gotta go see if Byrnes is ok." The other nodded, and followed Harris out of the room towards the parking lot.

Wasting no time, Harris merely rushed out of doorways without checking twice, he didn't really need to anyway. Bodies lay everywhere, including Spencer's. Clarke paused for a few seconds as he saw his friends corpse lying in a larger pool of blood than before. None of the squad members knew what had happened to Goode yet, until Wilds spotted the corpse crumpled down behind some boxes after checking out another shattered window.

Harris past the body on the stairs that Goode had taken care of earlier, advising the hostages not to look for too long at it. Hong's eyes widened as he past it, stepping in the blood surrounding the body and getting it on his jet black shoes.

"Not long now" Harris said to the hostages reassuringly. A loud burst of gunfire split the sound of footsteps. Clarke swore as he heard the fire and told the hostages to stay where they were. Suddenly, Harris thought of Byrnes and swore again as he crept into the parking lot, his weapon primed. Clarke and Wilds guarded the hostages on the staircase.

The fire stopped, tension roamed throughout the area as Harris looked hastily for the terrorist. He crept out into Byrnes line of sight, Harris spotted the van but couldn't see Byrnes. He was about to shout out to see if he was there when the terrorist finally revealed himself and leapt out of his cover firing rampantly.

Startled, Harris rolled to his left and was about to fire from the hip when he realized the terrorist was aimed from the shoulder and was split-seconds from blowing him away. Harris squeezed his eyes tight shut when he heard a trio of cracks from an M4, and an 'erk' sound from the terrorist.

Harris opened his eyes slowly, and saw his foe on the floor, dead. He peered out to look at the van. Byrnes was there, leaning out of his cover with his M4 still up to his shoulder. Harris let out a long breath of relief as he saw Byrnes unhurt and and still killing. It was only then that Harris looked around the parking lot and spotted another dead terrorist a few feet away from the recently deceased enemy.

"Ok it's clear!" Harris shouted to Byrnes and the hostages, waving his arm above his head. Clarke jogged down the staircase up to Harris, with Wilds and the hostages behind him. Byrnes clambered into the drivers position of van he hot wired earlier.

"Get in!" he shouted out the window which, unsurprisingly, had been smashed also. Byrnes revved the engine a few times encouraging the rest of the men to get in. Clarke let the hostages clamber into the back first, he helped King take the small step up, he was still clutching his stomach from where he had been beaten earlier.

As the rest of the team and hostages ran into the back of the truck, Harris stopped and looked towards the garage door they had entered from. "Byrnes!" the young gun poked his head out of the window and looked at him. "You get it going! I'll open this door and let you out!" he barked.

"One step ahead of 'ya!" Byrnes replied cheekily and revved the engine twice more.

Harris slung his weapon over his back and used both hands to lift up the door as he did earlier. It lifted up with ease, and slid all the way up to the top without any further aid. "Ok go!" Harris shouted.

Byrnes put the car in reverse and hit the accelerator. The car lurched backwards and to the right, Byrnes had forgotten about the puncture as he broke the right rear tail light on a surrounding wall.

Byrnes swore as the rest of the team laughed, he tried again to get the car in the right direction. He got it this time, driving up slowly to Harris and the now open door. Byrnes leant over and opened to the door next to Harris to let him in. He climbed in without another thought and closed it behind him.

"Let's go kid" he said softly. Byrnes floored it as the van screeched out of the parking lot, still with only three working tyres, and still a dip towards the back left.

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The team's van pulled up neatly into the police station parking lot, with a neat line of damaged tarmac followed the rear left wheel. Everybody got off hastily, ready to either go home, or re-united with families.

Byrnes got out and stretched, whilst Harris walked quickly back to the rear of the van, to see the hostages and the remainder of his men. The slide down door at the back of the van was still open. All the members inside were shivering, but with a smile of their face.

Byrnes joined Harris and received a firm pat on the back by Clarke, who chuckled and constantly made comments about Byrnes being a rookie and not shooting at cardboard for once.

The hostages clambered out, their aches and bruises finally coming into effect as most of them groaned as they exited the van. Harris couldn't help but chuckle, only to receive cold stares from Hong and King. You could imagine why they didn't want anybody mocking their life threatening adventure. "Hey I saved your life!" Harris responded happily, and chuckled more.

Byrnes was still talking to Clarke as they were heading towards the locker rooms. "Hard to believe I don't even have a driving license" Byrnes joked. Harris overheard and grinned from ear to ear.

"Dammit, the Chiefs gonna be happy when he sees all this shit." Harris said quietly to himself as he looked into the back of the van for the last time. But just before he was about to walk off, King grabbed him by the shoulder and asked with a smile: "Hey, do you um...have a pay phone anywhere?"

"Yeah sure right through there." Harris pointed towards the locker room Byrnes and Clarke were entering. Harris carried on walking before he was interrupted by King again.

"Um...you got any quarters?" King asked with a nervous smile on his face. Harris laughed out loud and reached into his pocket and drew out a quarter. "Thanks man." King said, now not nervous at all. He glanced at the coin and gave a very puzzled look as he examined the coin further.

"What" Harris inquired after seeing the puzzled look on King's face. King held it up high towards the light, and it revealed a very firmly placed bullet mark. Harris laughed out loud once again. "Oh my God" he chuckled.

King pocketed the coin as Harris walked away still laughing. Everybody now apart from him had entered the locker room and gone to do their own thing. He pushed the heavy doors aside and walked up to the pay phone in front of him.

He looked at the quarter Harris had given to him and looked at it in awe for a seconds before putting it in the slot and dialing his home number. A woman answered on the other end of the phone.

"Hello?"

"Honey, you'll never believe what happened at work today."

(a/n) So there you go! Hope you enjoyed it, sorry if it was a bit long too. I enjoyed writing it too, if I get some good reviews I guess I'll continue it until I run out of maps:) Anyways, please review, and sorry if it got a soppy at the end too :p Thanks for reading.


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